Attorneys for Yusuf Salaam believe voters shouldn’t have to disclose for whom they voted in the June 25 Alabama House District 67 run-off.

Attorneys John Kelly and Henry Pitts have filed an order in a Montgomery Circuit Court asking that a judge stop the Alabama Democratic Party from requiring “crossover” voters from taking the witness stand.

Salaam defeated LaTosha Brown in the June 25 run-off by 138 votes. Brown is challenging the election results, in part, because she said a number of people who voted in the Republican primary “crossed-over” and voted in the Democratic primary. The Democratic Party’s rules do not allow such crossover votes.

And therein lies the problem, according to Kelly and Pitts.

“Republican voters did not know about that rule,” Pitts said. “They were given no public notice about the crossover rule and they should not be called to testify.”

In the lawsuit filed against Democratic Party Chairman Redding Pitt, Brown, Cassandra Smith and Cliff Albright, the attorneys argue that the Democratic Party is an agency of the state.

According to a Supreme Court ruling, agencies of the state must file rules and regulations with the Alabama Legislative Reference Office. Kelly and Pitts discovered that the state Democratic Party never filed rules or regulations with the reference office.

Frank Casky, who works in that office, could not confirm that the Democrats had never filed those rules and regulations. However, Loretta Ferguson told Kelly and Pitts that the Democrats have never filed their rules with the state.

“I’m sure if that’s what Loretta said, then it’s true,” Casky said.

Both attorneys believe a sense of fairness has been lost in this election contest because of unpublished rules by the Democratic Party. For instance, on the top of every Democratic primary ballot is a phrase that says those who partake in the Democratic primary have vowed to support the party in the general election. In fact, an unenforced state law requires those who vote in the Democratic primary to vote a straight Democratic ticket in the general election.

“If they’re going to put that on the ballot, then why don’t they put something about crossover voting on there, too?” Pitts asked.

In the lawsuit written by Kelly, the attorneys believe the Democratic Party has taken on an air of superiority to the law.

“Under the guise of the ‘crossover’ rule, minions of the Democratic Party, appointed as “process servers” have served and continue to serve hundreds of subpoenas invading the privacy of the people in their homes and even in the sanctity of their places of worship, requiring them to be absent from their jobs and away from their families for the purpose of subjecting them to a political interrogation and compelling them to testify… under penalty of imprisonment for perjury” the suit says.

“These strong arm tactics of the Alabama Democratic Party, relying upon the law but without first following the law, are intolerable…”

In media reports, Faya Toure (formerly Rose Sanders) said Salaam and his attorneys are “drowning and will do anything at this stage.”

“They claim they were denied equal protection of the law when, in fact, they were the ones who denied us due process and equal protection,” she told The Montgomery Advertiser. “This is the same unfairness as when they brought us here as slaves.”

Calls placed to Brown, and two of her attorneys, April England-Albright and Collins Pettaway, were not returned to the Times-Journal.